Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

To promote social acceptance of nuclear power, Chinese government carried out public communication campaign at local level when Chinese government resumed nuclear power development after Fukushima. Previous studies have revealed the importance of public communication and proposed frameworks to analyze public communication as a policy instrument; however, to the best of our knowledge, no empirical study has evaluated the effects of different public communication instruments on public opinion. We select public communication campaign in the nuclear power field in China as the case, and test the effects of two different policy instruments: popularization of science and public participation. Viewing public communication campaign as a treatment, two rounds of questionnaire survey in 2014 and 2016, before and after public communication campaign, were carried out in Huizhou City, Guandong Province, which was planning to build its first nuclear power plant. We have collected 763 valid questionnaires, and applied difference-in-difference method with propensity score matching to evaluate the “intended effects” and the “unintended effects” of public communication campaign on public opinion.

As for intended effects, we find that encouraging public participation is more effective to promote local acceptance of nuclear power than popularization of science. Interestingly, we also find that public communication campaign have some unintended effects on public opinion, including making public more motivated to participate in local environmental governance and learn more environmental knowledge. A policy feedback mechanism might explain the rapid social learning on environmental issues through campaign-style public communication approach. Chinese government has strong ability of mobilization and allocation in and out of bureaucracy system, and influence public opinion. Knowledge and value can transmit from top to down and trigger social learning through interpretive effect in a rapid process. It also indicates that when mass public is engaged to shape policies, they themselves could be shaped by policies, especially in an authoritarian state.